Beech Creek Studios Had a question about the upcoming Tommy Emmanuel Christmas album, which we mentioned in passing last week. Well, Tommy's been pretty coy about the details (and, apparently, he changes the album's title daily), but we have heard the album will also feature the guitar of John Knowles, a little fiddle and mandolin from Aubrey Haynie, and a string quartet as well. Kim Person is serving as sound engineer. No official release date has been announced as yet. There was some information (such as it was) shared at CAAS 2011 (Chet Atkins Appreciation Society) and it was posted to YouTube, so we figured we'd share that with you (because it's funny!). Also Tommy and John Knowles played a handful of holiday tunes at the Chet Atkins tribute concert--"White Christmas", "Rudolph The Red Nosed Reindeer", "Jingle Bells", "Winter Wonderland" and "I'll Be Home For Christmas"--which were also uploaded to YouTube. We'll share one of those here and you can go to YouTube for the others at your leisure. Register free at Tommy TV for an exclusive 10 minute video of Mr. Emmanuel on "The Endless Road" as he makes Christmas magic in August.
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Among the many things I love about Jazz are the endless combinations of colors and textures--a feature well represented in the music (and cover art) of composer and pianist Geri Allen. The post bop artist points to Keith Jarrett, Bill Evans and Herbie Hancock as her primary influences, and there's no mistaking the inspiration of Mary Lou Williams as well. After 30 years of exceptional work, Allen has established herself as among the very best in modern jazz. Riding high on the success of her most recent albums, "Flying Toward The Sound" and "Geri Allen & Timeline Live", Geri Allen will release her first Christmas album this fall. Allen's label, Motéma Music, describes the coming holiday set as "a joyous celebration of the spirit of Christmas". The album will feature familiar classics mixed with ancient carols and Geri will perform on a variety of keyboard instruments--including a vintage Fender Rhodes, Hohner clavinet, concert celeste, Farfisa organ, and Grand Piano. The expected title of the album is "A Child Is Born" after the Thad Jones classic that has long been a favorite of Ms. Allen's. You can hear a Geri Allen solo performance of "A Child Is Born" via a January edition of NPR's "Generations In Jazz" concert; Allen's performance (which NPR says "steals the evening") begins about 29 minutes into the program. I've mentioned before how Jazz Christmas records seem to take longer to bubble up to the surface and be noticed. As much as I love Jazz, it still happens every year that many fine Yuletide triumphs in the genre escape my attention until the following year. So, just in case you missed them last year (as we did), here are a couple of note worthy 2010 Christmas Jazz releases. Icelandic beauty and Jazz princess Anna Mjoll lends a bit of seductive breathiness to a wide range of Christmas favorites, generally accompanied by gentle bossa and samba rhythms. The whole thing makes for an excellent fireside Christmas cuddle disc and Anna distinguishes herself as a legitimate vocalist to be reckoned with. But where "Christmas Jazzmaz" becomes transcendent pour moi is on the last 4 tracks where Anna sings the most classic of Christmas songs in Icelandic! Awesome! My favorite track, on first listen, is "Winter Wonderland"--both the English and Icelandic versions--with it's "come hither" tempo and delivery. Track I could have lived without? "Santa Baby". On this album, it sounds...redundant. In a matchup of the two, I'd still opt for Lisa Ono every time but this holiday confection from Anna Mjoll is a solid effort and definitely helps Iceland make up to the rest of the world for Bjork. Check out the song samples on Amazon. The music of Texas duo Mood Indigo lies somewhere between the playfulness of Les Paul and Mary Ford and the style of Jazz sometimes known as Hot Club. The husband and wife team of Joe Romano and Susan Elliott sound great together and "It's Christmas Eve" is a nice little listen. On first listen, a few tracks struck me as rising above and beyond. The pair is at their playful best on "I've Got My Love To Keep Me Warm" and "Baby It's Cold Outside". And the title track has just the right recipe of sweetness and warmth--a perfect Christmas cookie. The duo also scores well with a touch of something "olde"--as in "Gloucestershire Wassail" and the traditional Olde English sounding "In Praise Of Christmas". Once again, I could've lived without "Santa Baby". Could we retire that song for a decade or two? As accessible and enjoyable as it is, "It's Christmas Eve" wouldn't be at the top of my recommended list, but its certainly well worth checking the song samples at Amazon if you're looking for something off the all too beaten path. And if you're looking for a Christmas Jazz track that's likely to get lost in the shuffle and missed by other Christmas Jazz fans--a Christmas chestnut beloved by all yet unlike any other version ever--may we point the way to the Peter Evans Quintet album "Ghosts", released in January of this year. Evans and Company begin with Mel Torme's classic "The Christmas Song" but, by the time they finish, it's well worth a new title. The nearly 15 minute epic jazzical journey, as performed here, goes by the title "One to Ninety-Two". The rest of "Ghosts" has no seasonal connections, but "One to Ninety-Two", with its rapidly changing tempos and futuristic deconstructions and reconstructions, is a full Christmas buffet. Back to this year, progressive fusion band 8 recently completed work on their holiday single. 8 previously contributed the track "A Reason" to the 2009 Christmas collection "A Very Progressive Christmas, Volume 1". Keith McKelley is still working on raising the funding for his Christmas project. He's got all the arrangements ready to go, but studio time can be very expensive. And every dollar counts. I'd like to think the readers of Stubby's House of Christmas could toss a few bucks Keith's way. Surely, we've provided you with at least a dollar or two's entertainment and information. If you agree, please go to GoFundMe and drop a dollar in the pot. I think it would be good for our site and it would certainly be good for the world of Christmas music. Tell 'em Stubby sent you. ;-) Check out Keith's debut album to hear the kind of talent we're talking about and just imagine what he could do with Christmas. Mmmm, mmm, mmm. John Zorn has announced that, in addition to the vinyl, CD, and digital versions of "A Dreamers Christmas", there will also be a limited edition vinyl 45 from the album. No word on the specific tracks that will get the honor, but our vote is a resounding "Yes, please." Oh, and check the 45 picture sleeve artwork at the right. Ain't that a thing of beauty? And there's a new Christmas album coming from New York Jazz guitar great Doug Munro. "A Very Gypsy Christmas" is a bit of an homage to Jazz greats Django Reinhardt and Stephane Greppelli. You'll find a full write up on our Previews page. Which reminds me.... Things are about to get busy around here and it's time for one of our reminders that following the RSS feed for only this front page will leave you missing out on a lot of the action. The Previews page is starting to fill out. Our List is experiencing almost daily changes, now; you'll want to be checking that to find out such tidbits as whether Scott Weiland's holiday album has gotten a release date (it has--October 4!) or what the title of Mindy Gledhill's Christmas album will be ("Winter Moon"). And the other pages will be bustling soon, too. We've got some great new freebies coming very soon. We'll have another album for the International page and even a new entry coming in our Essentials collection very very soon. We'll be getting back to the full Reviews as well by the end of the month. I hope. Anyway, something tells me it's all happening here at the zoo, so I hope you'll stop by often in the months to come and I hope you enjoy yourself here whenever you do. I swear I knew this. For some reason, I just knew it. In my gut. Months ago. But I didn't have an interview to point to or anything else, so I said nothing here. My friends at Imwan, though, caught the notice almost as soon as it was posted on the duo's Facebook page just a few hours ago. "xciting news! @sheandhim will be releasing our first holiday record later this year! Been working on it a while! I'm super pumped about it! It's called a Very She & Him Christmas...." So, instead of being a prophet, I get to be the second...er, third...to share the news with you. As a consolation, we'll all get to enjoy "A Very She & Him Christmas" this holiday season. And if ever any artist was in the right place at the right time with the right sound to do a Christmas album, that would be Zooey Deschanel and Matt Ward...aka She & Him. Details as we hear them. The band Chicago, hitmakers for over 40 years, are unleashing another blizzard of holiday joy for the upcoming Christmas season. "Chicago XXXIII: O Christmas Three" is scheduled to arrive in October. Having covered most of the holiday standards and favorites on 1998's "The Christmas Album" (later re-released as "What's It Gonna Be Santa?" with additional material), Chicago selected some slightly lesser known tunes for this set. Christmas music maniacs are unlikely to think of "It's The Most Wonderful Time Of The Year" or "I Saw Three Ships" as the "B" list of the Christmas canon (I mean, we could point the band to some really lesser known Christmas songs, couldn't we?), but compared to "White Christmas", "Silent Night" and most of the rest of their previous holiday CD, well, you can understand what they're saying there. Chicago brought Phil Ramone on board to produce this one, they stuck with mostly mid and uptempo material, gave each song a Chicago makeover, and brought in some big name guests to boot--Dolly Parton, America, Steve Cropper. And to judge from the samples...well, you can hear for yourself...the album sounds great. Me, I'm immediately in love with "Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays". This is about as secular a Christmas album as you're likely to see and it sounds like "What Are You Doing New Year's Eve?" is pretty much the only song to get the full ballad treatment here. But there's holiday sentiment to spare, fresh as pine tree arrangements, and that great horn driven sound Chicago does better than anyone on the planet. You can pre-order "O Christmas Three", now and for a limited time, direct from the band for $9.99, for which price you'll get both the physical CD and a digital copy. Or sign up at Amazon to be notified when the album becomes available for pre-order there. 1. Wonderful Christmas Time (featuring Dolly Parton)
2. Rockin' Around The Christmas Tree 3. I Saw Three Ships (featuring America) 4. Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays 5. What Are You Doing New Year's Eve? 6. It's The Most Wonderful Time Of The Year 7. I'll Be Home For Christmas 8. On The Last Night Of The Year 9. Merry Christmas Darling (featuring BeBe Winans) 10. Rockin' And Rollin' On Christmas Day (featuring Steve Cropper) 11. My Favorite Things 12. O Christmas Tree 13. Jingle Bells 14. Here Comes Santa Claus/Joy To The World Well, here's something you don't get to report everyday. Marvin Aday--aka Meat Loaf--is planning a Christmas album for 2012. It's one of 3 albums he has planned, the first of which is due in February. "Hot Holidays", Meat Loaf says, will feature a number of guests--Reba McEntire, Garth Brooks, assorted rock stars and an actor or two. Meat Loaf debuted in 1971 with the album "Stoney & The Meatloaf" on Motown's Rare Earth label, but really struck it big in 1976-1977 with the multi-million selling "Bat Out Of Hell". First up in Meat Loaf's new deal with Sony is "Hell In A Handbasket", an album featuring rappers Chuck D and Lil Jon, the latter of whom Meat met on Celebrity Apprentice (wonder if that means Gary Busey's on the Christmas album). Meat says "Handbasket" is about how he feels about the state of the world today and, as such, is his most personal record to date. Meat is also laying down tracks for a third as yet unnamed project. The now 63 year old rock star is recording between concert dates. When released, these will be Meat Loaf's first officially released holiday tracks, so far as I'm aware; though rumors of an overseas "B" side of "Silent Night" persist, I've never come across it. There are Meat Loaf Christmas bootlegs out there--including "Silent Night"--most notably from radio performances for WPLJ-FM in New York. Meat Loaf greatly credited WPLJ with helping break "Bat Out Of Hell" in the New York market and, for many years, would appear on the station in one form or another around Christmas and New Years. |
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